Francis Scott Key Bridge (Baltimore) hit by Cargo Ship and Collapsed

GMBoy said:
I was born and raised in Baltimore, lived 5 min from the bridge and drove it a million times. This is a terrible situation all the way around. I have so many friends that work the harbor (including tug boats thru the harbor) and commute the bridge - thank goodness they are all ok. I pray for the best outcome for all.
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I wonder how many layoffs will happen as a result of bridge collapse ?

CSX and Northfolk Southern will have to transport shipping containers to other ports on East coast.
 
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Posting this again as the link in my original post is to the live footage and no longer has the impact footage in it:



Timestamps at the top of the video:

01:22:55 - Ship comes in to view
01:24:32 - Lights fade out on ship
01:25:31 - Lights come back on
01:25:45 - Smoke from stack increases massively
01:26:37 - Lights fade back off, smoke continues
01:27:10 - Lights back on
01:27:11 - Appears to begin departing from traveling straight
01:28:43 - Contact
 
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Props to the agencies that got traffic on the bridge stopped. Just before the impact, there was a decent amount of traffic on the bridge and it could have been so much worse.

I just can't fathom how the DOT workers didn't get off, surely they would have seen the ship and you would have thought there would have been horns sounding.
 
mk378 said:
When entering into a critical navigation situation, would it be a standard practice to keep both generators running?
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No. Providing the ship is not having and operating problems, one generator is all that is required. The second one is for backup only when needed. But they would need to known problem is happening. Out at sea this wouldn't have been this much of a catastrophe.,,
 
tcp71 said:
As mentioned, extremely sad for those missing and their families. What does the US export to Sri Lanka? Was Baltimore just a stop along the way on this ship's route?
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Ships purpose in the world is to transport freight of every type, around the world. They may have delivered containers to this port from anywhere in the world. Or loaded up containers to go anywhere in the world. That's what they do.,,
 
Danno said:
Silly question from a non-engineer, but where are the bridge pier protectors, to keep this from happening?
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The typical protection won't stop modern container ships. It would require a wedge shaped structure that extends 50+ meters away just to try and deflect a ship of that size away.
 
BigCahuna said:
As sad as this accident was, it will create alot of jobs rebuilding that structure.,,
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True enough.

I suspect that once the search is called off, things will move pretty quickly. They are probably already arranging for a crane to come in and clear that channel. Once that is done, traffic will be able to resume at a pretty much normal rate for the most part.

I don't think there would be any reason to leave the bridge parts in-situ for investigation, it is pretty clear what happened and that nothing could really have been done to prevent it, given the state of the bridge before the accident (Not having massive piers 'guarding' the bridge supports).
 
racer12306 said:
The latest info I'm seeing is saying that after the mayday, they cleared the bridge. The only people on the bridge were MDTA construction crews. Not sure why they stayed on the bridge, but those are the casualties.
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Sadly, they might not have had a way to get in contact with those guys (and girls).
 
Hall said:
The typical protection won't stop modern container ships. It would require a wedge shaped structure that extends 50+ meters away just to try and deflect a ship of that size away.
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Just doing some relly rough math with some online calculators, the impact would be equivalent to .33 tons of TNT, or 1,027,717,992 ft-lbs of force.

So, lots of energy to dissipate.
 
Donald said:
My Dad said engineers calculated with slide rules and then doubled.
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That's a "safety factor". Sometimes you use 1.5x, sometimes 2x, and so on. In today's business world, cost gets factored in where you don't always have this liberty.

Donald said:
With calculators and computers no need for that.
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I used to do 3D modeling and when I was designing something, I could define what each components material was, i.e. carbon steel, and the system knew all of the material's data (tensile strength, modulus of elasticity, etc) and then run a stress analysis on the part or on an assembly of parts. With this data, you could know that thinner material would work to save money or you could remove material (cut slots) in order to save weight.
 
y_p_w said:
Maersk is the big name here, but they don’t own or operate the ship. However, they’ve got the deep pockets.
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Maersk chartered the ship but had no operational responsibility. I am sure they will try but I don’t see them paying.
 
Delta said:
Besides the possible lives lost here, the logistical impacts this is going to create is going to be a nightmare.
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I work for Consol Energy and 90% of our coal travels through the port. Our loading area is near the bridge. We were talking about the impacts for us today while under ground
 
BigCahuna said:
I have some experience working on ships from years ago And maybe I can explain a few things on the workings on board. First the electrical system onboard a ship is nothing like a car or truck. They have a large engine that only supply's the power to the prop to move the ship. They make from 30,000-60,000 housepower @ 900-120 rpm's. The individual cylinders can be "turned off" if needed. Onboard there is usually 2 generator rooms that each have giant diesel generator in it. One is for main usage, and the other is a backup. They operate independently from the main engine. These supply power for all the lighting, heating and air conditioning, pumps, refrigeration and navigation equipment. What's shown at the time of the crash on tv, the lights were flickering, indicating they were having a problem. It could have been several reasons for that. But the main thing to remember is if the ship was on the correct course, it would have passed under the bridge without hitting the support. That kinda tells me they were not on course. I'm not sure of the laws governing there, whether they needed to have a Pilot onboard while heading outbound. A Pilot is a local Captain familiar with the waters where the ship is going, and directs the ships pilot where to steer. Even if they did notice they were not on course, it takes a couple miles to stop or alter the course of the ship. There are no quick maneuvers with ships. It was amazing how fast the Bridge collapsed after being struck, even tho the ship wasn't moving fast. Like everything else in the world today, they have been changing over to electrical equipment to operate everything . No more large ship's wheels, just a joystick like from a video game. If you loose power, you can loose the ship.,,,
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If this is not an independent azipod and bow thruster steered ship, then why where there no tug boats, especially in that channel with a bridge? So what is or would be the main engine, a big direct coupled to the prop Wartsila?

It looks like the power was very high and was cut just before going into the bridge, if it was in full reverse there would be no reason to cut the power so soon.

I'd like to know why no talk about the boats insurance footing the bill to fix that?

One news person said it was a steering failure, obvious ! And another news person said it was a power failure, yeah just as it turned into it.

Looks to me like they need to buy a few old ferry boats to handle some of the traffic.
 
Exhaustgases said:
One news person said it was a steering failure, obvious ! And another news person said it was a power failure, yeah just as it turned into it.
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It was pretty clear in the video that they were struggling with the boat from the time that it came into view until impact. The power was off and on a couple times.

Once they went full astern and dropped the anchor they were mostly at the mercy of physics since they would have lost most all directional control at that point. It is a fixed prop boat, so with full reverse in you lose most all rudder authority from my understanding of it.

Might be a situation where they would have been better off staying under power going forward and steered around it. But who knows.
 
billt460 said:
The government does nothing quickly.... Especially this one.
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They rebuilt the Minneapolis and Philadelphia bridges in pretty good time.

Yes I know the Philly one was a cheat, they dumped dirt there and closed the road underneath temporarily.

I bet contractors are staging equipment already waiting for the "go." There are only so many contractors set up for something this heavy and it can take weeks to even get the stuff there.
 
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